Encouraged by sales of the recently introduced SG Series, but realizing they needed to gain more ground in the crowded solidbody guitar market, Gibson enlisted the services of noted automobile designer Ray Dietrich in the creation of a new solidbody design. The Firebird Series, which debuted in the summer of 1963, was notable for its modernistic, asymmetrical shape, neck-thru-body construction, and mini-humbucker pickups. Like the SG Series, the different Firebird models ranged across the price spectrum, from the economy Firebird I up to the deluxe Firebird VII.